Sunday 30 September 2012

Moon Cake Festival / Mid-Autumn celebration - 2012

I did not prepare any special dishes for Moon Cake / Mid-Autumn Festival at my own home this year.  I spent the whole morning doing house chaos, preparing lunch, this and that, then realised that half day is gone, and I have not started doing revision with my girls yet whom will be having their last term of examination  starting tomorrow.

I spent the whole afternoon doing revision with Pearl.  The examination scope is too wide in this final exam.  Pearl, a Primary 1 student, she needs all the guidance as she still can't do her revision independently like her big sister does. We spent four hours revising while Crystal taking a nap after finishing her own revision.

 We were invited to younger brother's home for dinner at last minute, I haven't got the time to prepare anything, merely able to bring along a moon cake and zoomed we went for the dinner after shower.  

We had a simple but filling meal prepared by SIL, Catherine.  Thank you *.*



Children with their Lanterns / Tang Lungs

 Close up of Crystal and Pearl's lanterns.  2 pieces for RM3.50.  Need to place candle to light it up.

 later, Ensond joined in with his tiny mini lantern which created a bit of havoc (fighting over it)
 Pearl with lotus lantern belongs to Dylan.  Anneliese with her own musical lotus lantern

 moon cakes after meal is a must on Moon Cake / Mid-Autumn Festival
 thrill cutting up moon cakes
 moon cakes are best served with Chinese tea or whatever tea will do :)
 Crystal with grandma enjoying moon cakes
 another round of playing with the lanterns at home before retired to bed to get ready for their examination tomorrow.  

HAPPY MOON CAKE FESTIVAL EVERYONE!  
AND GOOD LUCK IN YOUR EXAMS MY GIRLS!!

Friday 28 September 2012

Malaysian First Day Cover - Malaysian Festival Siri II

The post office issued a First Day Cover on 27 September 2012.  The theme is "Malaysian Festivals Siri II".  There are a series of 5 stamps with a denominations of 0.60 cents each.  

This issue is not as popular as the one issued on 13 September 2012 for the Diamond Jubilee for Queen's Elizabeth II and the Royal visit of Prince William and his wife, Catherine to Malaysia.  For this issue, I still managed to buy the stamps, the inserts and envelopes today, one day after it was issued, unlike the earlier, I still have not got the First Day Cover envelopes for the stamps and a stamp chop on them.

The stamps for the "Malaysian Festival Siri II" are pretty cute.  Malaysia is a country rich with a mix of races, religion  and culture, therefore, there are festivals celebrated by each races.  The festivals on the stamps are Hari Raya Aidiladha, Moon Cake Festival, Thaipusam, Pesta Kaul, Regatta Lepa.  

I bought 3 sets, 1 for my colleague whom also a collector of First Day Covers.  She managed to get 2 more sets later in the afternoon too..

getting ready to stick and paste the stamps on the envelopes.  At the same time trying to figure out how is the best way to arrange the stamps so that they look nice..*;*
I got the rubber stamp now and ready to stamp chop on the stamps to make them into the official First Day Covers :)
done with the rubber stamping 


I particularly like the Christmas Tree on the envelope, it further enhances the meaning of this issue of First Day Covers "Perayaan Di Malaysia Siri II".  It is a beautiful piece of First Day Cover with the colourful Christmas tree image.

A closer look 


The Christmas Tree image



On my way out, I noticed this bunting.  A special series of setemku collection  on the adventure of Upin Ipin has been released on 15 September 2012.  If you are a fan of the Malaysian most popular animated children series, visit Pos Malaysia to collect the limited edition of Kembara of Upin & Ipin Setemku Collection.    


Next to it is the Perayaan Di Malaysian Siri II bunting.

Thursday 27 September 2012

Jelly Moon Cakes from a friend

Our girls are so happy to receive this box of Jelly Moon Cakes from Aunty Cindy, one of the parents we got to know from the school.  

They kept these Jelly Moon Cakes in the fridge untouched till I got home from work in the evening because they wanted to give me a surprise.


It's a pleasant surprise.  We are very pleased, a big thank you to cindy.  Though jelly moon cakes are much easier to make as compare to the traditional ones, I can see a lot of time and efforts have been put into making these 4 types of jelly moon cakes: 

Dragon fruit, with real fruit in the centre

Coconut milk

this one taste like barley

Orange flavour

ready to attack 

The jelly texture is just nice, and cool from the fridge. We ate all the 4 moon cakes leaving the empty containers.   

Monday 24 September 2012

Moon Cake / Mid Autumn Festival 2012

It's the time of the year we celebrate Moon Cake / Mid-Autumn festival.  The Chinese Lunar calendar of 15th August falls on 30 September  this year, that's this coming Sunday.

Moon cakes has becoming more and more expensive. My better half received 2 boxes of moon cakes from his company's service provider that day, single egg yolk in lotus paste and double egg yolks in lotus paste, 1 box each.  We do not have to buy any more moon cakes this year.




Our girls like to eat moon cakes especially the egg yolks, they really know how to pick the most expensive one.  They serve themselves moon cakes whenever they feel like, I have to keep reminding them to control the consumption.  Moon cakes are not only sweet, too much of that will cause heatiness thus sore throat to some people.  I guess that's why moon cakes are best served with Chinese Tea.


Double yolks moon cake is so tempting.

Sunday 23 September 2012

Rewards from Taking Survey - KFC/Pizza Hut/Ayamas vouchers

A registered post was sent to me by the survey company but some way somehow it got lost.  The survey company contacted me 12 days ago, informing me that they will resend my rewards that I redeemed through normal post.  

It arrived in my mail box 2 days ago. Though I have been receiving these vouchers many times before, I always have the thrill of opening the envelope each time I receive them.

Taking survey is rewarding.  I tried not to miss any surveys allocated to me by the survey companies that I joined.  Because each completed survey I take, there are points given.  Through these points I could either redeem money by cheque, KFC/Pizza Hut/Ayamas vouchers like this one, McDonald's vouchers, shopping vouchers at major local super/hypermarkets, or I could choose to give charity donation.  Each individual survey companies reward their members differently.   

To participate in taking surveys, one will have to register as a member with the survey company.  An email will be sent to the member's registered email informing them of any survey waiting for them to complete.  At times, you might not qualify for a survey but it's ok, there are more coming through from time to time.   It normally takes 5-30 minutes to complete a survey, each surveys are different.  By taking market surveys, it gives us the opportunities to voice our opinions on the products/services that are already in the market and also of those new products to be launched in the near future.  

Tuesday 18 September 2012

My New Domestic Helper

My new domestic helper is much smaller and not as noisy as the previous one..I am talking about my new Samsung vacuum cleaner here, not the human helper one would thought, ^.^

Our old Singer Vacuum cleaner of more than 10 years finally called it a quit.  It produced a burning smell when I used it about 2 months ago, I was so scare it would burn and explode, so I prefer to stop using it rather than hurting myself.  We redeemed it from Cosway after collecting enough coupons by selling boxes and boxes of moon cakes then.  It did a good job like any other vacuum cleaner but surprisingly our new Samsung vacuum cleaner though smaller in size has better suction powder in comparison, the new Samsung vacuum cleaner is lighter and more portable for me to carry up and down the stairs.

The new Samsung Vaccum cleaner, the last in stock.   The price is relatively reasonable.  A newer model is already out in the shop to replace this one but we do not mind the older model.

 Our old Singer Vacuum cleaner, I always have the problem in keeping the wire in place.  It uses the washable dust bag, I am really glad that Clet was the one who help to clean the dust bag all along. 
 the old and the new
 it is a bagged type, collecting all the dust into the bag convenient to dispose off when it is full. No more washing of dust bag.
very basic with only 3 types of suction nozzles, it's good enough for me.  Just hope that it will lasts.

Monday 17 September 2012

Additional Member in the family - My Niece

We had an additional member to our family today.  Our little niece is born at 3.58pm this afternoon to my youngest brother, Albert and SIL, Shirly.  Little baby niece weighed at 2.98kg, 50.5cm long was crying out loud in the first hour after birth, I guess she was hungry, because SIL hasn't had any breakfast nor lunch before going into labour.  She got a little quieter after being fed some milk.  Here she is, 


Today's Brunch

On a lazy Public Holiday like today, I got up really late, at 10am.    I took the opportunity to get some online works done the night before knowing that I could get up a little late in the morning.  

I knew that my girls are hungry at that hour in the morning, I quickly prepared this set of brunch as soon as I got up.  Simple with just bull's eye egg, baked beans, sausages and white bread cut into snowman and star shapes.  They had the bread with sliced cheese.  I received thumbs up for this brunch, probably they were really hungry :DD  Crystal even requested me to prepare Star Shapes cheese sandwiches for her school's tea break bento tomorrow.



Sunday 16 September 2012

Private Functions at Hoffbrau Steaks

We were having a bit of a hard time trying to decide where to hold Pearl's birthday party recently.  Initially we decided to have a dinner among ourselves, only the four of us in the family, and buy Pearl a birthday present of her choice, but she has grown another year older and wiser, she wants to invite her cousins and friends to her birthday party.  Without discussing with us, she took the liberty to invite her classmates to her birthday party.  I got to know about it when one of her classmates' mother came to ask me where is Pearl's birthday party going to be because Pearl has invited her daughter to the party. 

We started to look for a suitable place in town to have the party, it was not easy.  We need a place where is suitable for kids and adults,  most importantly with a special menu for kids.  As we all know feeding the kids at the party can sometimes be a challenge to parents. The kids can just refuse to eat if the food are not suitable for them.  

If we were in Texas area, we will definitely choose the Hoffbrau Steaks as our venue for the birthday party.   It is one of the restaurants in Dallas tx to have special room for private functions, they also have got kid's menu to top it all.  The price is very reasonable.  There are 6 types of set meals to choose from the kid's menu,  they are, Chicken Strips, Hoffbrau Mac N'Cheese, Grilled Cheese, Hamburger, Cheeseburger and Corn Dogs, all these meals are served with steak fries or steamed broccoli, and a beverage.   With so much choices, the kids would be happily place their order for the meals they want.  

Hoffbrau Steaks is one of the best restaurants in Dallas for dine in and catering.  If you are Dallas, check out their restaurant at the following address:

7601, Campbell Rd,
#725 Dallas,
TX75248
Tel:972-735-0800

Friday 14 September 2012

Steamed eggs with minced Pork

I am not a fussy eater, so long as I am not asked to take those fatty animal fats.  I always buy lean pork and slice away any fats attached to it when I prepare my cooking.  Clet always finds lean meat tough to consume.  He got the idea from the school canteen and came out with his superlicious and solid steamed minced lean pork with eggs.  It is one of the favourite dishes which our girls love to have for lunch from the school canteen.

Our girls can never get bored with fried egg and they are very much of the meat eaters just like their daddy (no matter how I convinced them to eat more vegetable).  Once tried on eggs with minced pork, it has  since became their favourite dish.  We could see their smile on their face when they see this is served on the table. I believe this is also the all time favourite for many of us.  

Clet's version of Steamed eggs with minced pork look like this,